VR coasters ain’t over until the fat lady sings

“Phantom of the Opera”-themed experience coming to Europa Park

For a while there, virtual reality coasters–roller coasters that are outfitted with VR goggles so that passengers can experience a story in the metaverse synced to physical ride thrills–were a thing. About eight years ago, parks were racing to get in on the trend. But, for a number of reasons, most parks have abandoned the concept.

Europa-Park, however, has stayed the course. Perhaps that’s not surprising, since the the pioneering German park debuted the first VR coaster. If anything, Europa appears to be doubling down on the hybrid rides. Recently, it announced that it would be introducing a new VR experience on its Eurosat ride based on Andrew Lloyd Webber’s beloved musical, “The Phantom of the Opera.” Cue the falling chandelier.

How about a little “Music of the Night” to accompany your coaster ride? (Europa-Park)

Eurosat Coastiality – The Phantom of the Opera will be a retooling of an existing VR experience. Eurosat is an indoor coaster that opened in 1989. In Disney terms, it is housed inside a dome that looks like Spaceship Earth’s younger cousin, and the non-VR coaster ride is a bit like Space Mountain with the trains rushing past themed elements. There is even a similar reentry tunnel. Eurosat features a fairly long spiral lift, reaches a height of 84 feet, and hits a top speed of 37 mph.

In 2018, Europa overhauled the ride with new track, new trains, and a new theme. Now called Eurosat - CanCan Coaster, it draws on Moulin Rouge for inspiration, and guests hear the lively music associated with the high-stepping dance as they careen in the darkness. At the same time that the park reimagined the attraction, it also incorporated a separate VR option it calls Eurosat Coastiality. Guests that choose the virtual ride enter a separate queue and board in a purpose-designed loading station. Coastiality uses the same track, but passengers are treated to a digitally-enhanced experience.

The Phantom lurks outside of the Eurosat dome. (Europa-Park)

Soon, coaster passengers will be able to virtually go into the recesses of an opera house where the disfigured Phantom lurks. It seems like a mighty strange theme for a VR thrill ride. (Then again, Universal is building Dark Universe, one of the five themed lands at its new Epic Universe park. It will be based on Universal Studios’ classic monsters, which includes none other than The Phantom of the Opera.)

My experiences with VR coasters have not been great. I rode Kraken Unleashed, SeaWorld Orlando’s VR-enhanced version of its B&M floorless coaster. The park offered it from 2017 to 2018. The content was compelling enough, but about a quarter of the way through the ride, my field of view inexplicably changed in the goggles. The perspective shifted a few degrees, so that if I looked straight ahead, the action was centered to my left. That destroyed the illusion and made for a disjointed experience. Fortunately, the disconnect didn’t cause any queasiness.

The same couldn’t be said for the miserable experience I had aboard Superman the Ride at Six Flags New England. Without VR goggles, the hypercoaster is one of my favorite rides on the planet (Earth and Krypton). For the 2016 season (and only that season), the park added a VR overlay. When I was in the station and donned the goggles, I was virtually transported to a futuristic monorail station in Metropolis that was rendered in an animated, comic book style. So far, so good.

But, as the train started ascending the lift hill, the visual in my headset still had me parked in the station, waiting for the “monorail” to leave. And, according to my virtual view, I stayed, supposedly motionless, in the station for the entire ride. The sensation of Superman’s forceful hills, airtime, helices, and other elements didn't jive with what I was seeing, and the disparity was brutal. I never get motion sickness on coasters (or any other rides for that matter), but I nearly lost it that day. For some reason, in the heat of the high-thrills moment, it didn’t occur to me to simply shut my eyes and stop the discombobulating visuals from wreaking havoc with my vestibular system. How bad was it? While I never actually, er, released the kraken, the nausea was so intense that I was down for the count and couldn’t tackle any more rides that day.

Superman is an extraordinary ride–without VR. (Six Flags)

My Superman debacle was extreme, but even a slight conflict between what you are seeing and what you are feeling on a VR coaster as it moves along the track can cause sickness. Both of my VR ride experiences also illustrate how the technology can go kablooey. There are all kinds of other issues with VR, including low-resolution, subpar graphics that deliver less-than-convincing virtual environments, and latency, or a lag time response that prevents the visuals from keeping up with riders as they turn their heads. Perhaps the biggest downfall of VR coasters, however, is that they can be an operational and logistical nightmare for parks–and therefore for visitors. It can take a substantial additional staff as well as a lot of time to get the headsets to riders, snugly secure them, and properly sync them with the system. That time leads to significantly lower throughput (the number of passengers that can cycle through a ride), thereby making lines and wait times much longer.

Europa, however, seems to have developed a clever workaround. By establishing a separate queue and loading station for riders choosing Eurosat Coastiality’s VR experience along with a sliding transfer track, the non-VR Eurosat - CanCan Coaster line and load/unload processes can proceed unimpeded. Also, the park has developed a unique “Roam & Ride” feature in which guests don and adjust wireless VR goggles in the loading station and see a virtual station and train in their headsets that matches the physical ones. That way, they can get into and disembark the train without having to diddle with goggles. Also, Europa charges an additional fee to ride Coastiality, thereby tempering demand and helping to keep wait times manageable.

Eurosat, with its relatively modest stats, seems like a much better VR coaster candidate than headlining rides such as Superman and Kraken. They don’t need a VR overlay to attract guests. Plus their extreme forces and elements don’t readily conform to a virtual storyline. It would seem to make more sense to introduce VR on lower-profile, less popular coasters to build ridership and create some marketing buzz.

Who knows? Maybe there will be a second wave of VR coasters. Europa-Park would appear to have cracked the code and developed a viable template that other parks could follow.

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Have you been on any VR coasters? If so, how were they? Are you surprised that Europa-Park is offering a new VR coaster experience?